WEEKEND EXCURSION; Retracing the Steps Trod at Gettysburg

The National Park Service recommends on its Web site that visitors to the Gettysburg National Military Park spend at least four hours touring the battlefield and museum, ''though an entire day is more desirable.''

As understatements go, this is a keeper. You could spend a lifetime here and never outlast the topic or the topography. But a weekend excursion to this 6,000-acre shrine is a start. It can help to explain why Civil War buffs are so ardent, why veterans of more recent wars come here as if to communion and why historians, novelists and filmmakers can't leave Gettysburg alone.

Until you have walked the stone walls and trekked the woods along Seminary Ridge (the Rebels' line before their final infantry assault) and then switched sides to gaze back across the fields from Little Round Top (the fabled knob of stone-strewn Union high ground), you cannot truly understand what happened here from July 1 to 3, 1863. The best books on the subject are merely informed preparation. You must bring your imagination and suspend your disbelief. Because no one can explain, really, why 170,000 men from Maine to Mississippi -- men who only two years before had claimed common citizenship -- came here to kill one another.

Yet they did, and the history they made is worth at least one sunny summer day 137 years later.

My 14-year-old son, Alec, and I made the trip together. By car from the New York area, it's a smooth four-and-a-half-hour drive along the New Jersey and Pennsylvania Turnpikes, about 210 miles.

Both of us brushed up on history before we set out, but I was more manic.

I bought several hour-by-hour guides to the battle, consulted Shelby Foote's multivolume ''Civil War'' (Random House, 1963) and scoured the library for books that profiled commanders and analyzed strategy.

A Compelling Novel

The best book of all turned out not to be a history book but a novel that many people had recommended as both good reading and good history: Michael Shaara's ''Killer Angels,'' which won a Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Shaara personalizes the battle, which he presents and analyzes through imagined thoughts and conversations. In the novel, Gen. Robert E. Lee and Gen. James Longstreet are at odds over Lee's plan to take the battle to the Union lines. Gen. John Buford, a cavalry officer, is the first to skirmish with the Confederates on July 1. Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, commander of the 20th Maine Volunteers, saw some of the most desperate fighting of the battle on the second and third days.

But first a disclaimer. I had never been a Civil War buff.

Perhaps it was the misleading name: Civil War, a flagrant contradiction. It was more likely, though, that I had been numbed by the perpetual tape loop of my childhood social studies curriculum. It unwound each September with Columbus's voyage to the New World and halted abruptly each June just shy of James Buchanan's inauguration. In junior high school we touched on the Missouri Compromise, Fort Sumter and John Brown. Grant drank, we learned, and Lee's horse was named Traveller. We memorized the Gettysburg Address. History as film strip.

A Dysfunctional Country

Then one day, long after college and in pursuit of self-education, I picked up ''This Hallowed Ground,'' Bruce Catton's highly regarded one-volume account of the war. I was hooked on the concept: a dysfunctional young country -- a vague cohort of adolescent jurisdictions calling itself the United States -- tears itself apart, creating heros and villains and gory legends at every turn.

In a blood feud between two starkly different cultures, one slave, one free, place names pop up like so many tombstones in a family plot: Bull Run, Fredericksburg, Antietam, Vicksburg. A rancorous social and political drama played out in the dangerous confusion of 19th-century warfare -- a war waged by gentlemanly generals, North and South, many of whom attended West Point together in the 1830's and 40's.

In all of this, Gettysburg stands out, and not just for its ruthlessness. Mistakes were made here, some in the name of glory. But it was the beginning of the end for the Confederacy, the so-called High Water Mark, that ended with the repulse of Gen. George E. Pickett's charge against the center of the Union line on the third day. It was, too, a crushing and bitter defeat for Lee, for whom Gettysburg was the second and final incursion north of the Mason-Dixon line. (The first resulted in the bloody battle at Sharpsburg, Md., in September 1862.)

At the time the two armies came upon it, Gettysburg was a market town of 2,000, a quiet crossroads whose dusty pikes led to the state capital, at Harrisburg, as well as to Carlisle, Chambersburg and York. It was home to a Lutheran seminary and Pennsylvania (later Gettysburg) College. Nothing much happened here until, by chance, the Army of the Potomac, under Gen. George G. Meade, and the Army of Northern Virginia, under Lee, caught wind of each other.

They had last engaged in Chancellorsville, Va., at the start of May, when Lee's army, outnumbered 2 to 1, had brilliantly outmaneuvered the Yankees under the feckless command of Gen. Joseph Hooker.

Emboldened, Lee and the Confederate Government in Richmond had decided to shadow the Yankees, now under Meade's command, as they made their way back north through Virginia and Maryland and into Pennsylvania. This second invasion of the North, the Southerners hoped, would permit Lee to cut off Meade from Washington, forcing Abraham Lincoln to recognize the Confederate States of America.

That didn't happen. On July 4, 1863, after three days of fighting, Lee's army pulled back and headed south. More than 51,000 soldiers on both sides had been killed, wounded or captured.

Defined by Battle

Were it not for the battlefied, which surrounds and includes the town itself, Gettysburg would still be the same quiet hamlet it was in the middle of the 19th century. Today, with a population of 7,000 and a tourist influx of 1.5 million a year, it is an antique stage set for restaurants, pubs and souvenir shops of all kinds.

There's a wax museum, a Hall of Presidents and a business that offers tours of ''haunted Gettysburg.'' The Gettysburg Address is reproduced on plaques, brochures and dinner menus. You can visit the home of Jennie Wade, the only civilian killed during the battle; she was shot through the door of her house by a Louisiana marksman as she baked biscuits for Union soldiers.

But the battlefield, in its scope and the bountiful greens and tans of summer, is a serious monument, and the Park Service treats it as such.

You can of course go to Gettysburg unschooled: with just two brochures, offered free at the visitor center, the war and the battleground become instantly accessible. A foldout map pinpoints all the significant skirmish and battle lines. It includes a 16-point self-guided auto tour, a synopsis of the fighting and diagrams of troop positions on each day. The other pamphlet, ''Planning Your Visit,'' is a schedule of daily educational programs offered by park rangers, who know their stuff. Their spiels tend to be as entertaining as they are informative.

Hallowed Ground

On the Sunday we were there, Matt Atkinson, a ranger from Mississippi, conducted a 35-minute tour of the National Cemetery, which Lincoln dedicated on Nov. 19, 1863, four months after the battle.

''Most of you probably had to memorize the Gettysburg Address,'' he said, speaking to a gathering largely made up of Northerners. ''That wasn't a priority where I came from.'' Pause for laughter. ''Just kidding,'' he added quickly.

For our full day at the park, Alec and I bought an auto-tour tape cassette for $10 that includes yet another map of the battlefield. Road signs with stars on them clearly mark the route.

It's almost impossible to get lost. But I had a habit of listening so intently to the narration that I stopped either too soon or too late. Often Alec caught me pointing to what I thought was the famous Peach Orchard or McPherson's Barn when actually I had parked at Stop 4 and not Stop 5.

''This is what it must have been like following some general around,'' Alec said. ''And he didn't have a tape.''

Fair enough. So a suggestion: before you take the tour, stop at the visitor center, tour the museum of relics -- guns, bugles, cannons, uniforms -- and go to the electric map. For $3 you'll see a room-size relief map with blinking lights and hear a 30-minute narration that allows you to get a sense of the park and the battle.

Interesting but less important, perhaps, is the cyclorama of the final day's assault, the charge led by Pickett at Lee's orders: 12,000 men walked a mile toward the heavily fortified center of the Union line; fewer than half came back. The 360-degree painting, housed in its own specially designed building, was completed in 1883 by a French artist, Paul Philippoteaux, whose work was all the rage at the end of the 19th century.

By 5 p.m. on Friday, having viewed the map and grabbed some brochures, Alec and I headed to our weekend retreat, the Battlefield Bed and Breakfast Inn, a five-minute drive on Route 15 at the southern edge of the park. A large comfortable old farmhouse (the original structure dates to 1809), it is really just a disguised theme park for its owners, Charles and Florence Tarbox.

Charlie Tarbox, 52, is a plump, loquacious and utterly engaging criminal defense lawyer from California who retired from the courtroom to pursue his undergraduate love: military history.

In 1994, after a year of construction, the Tarboxes opened the former sheep and dairy farm as an inn on Memorial Day weekend. The rooms are comfortable, the surroundings (46 acres, a horse barn and a passel of feral outdoor cats) bucolic and the breakfasts as good as they look. But the treat is Mr. Tarbox, who lectures each morning from 8 to 9, before breakfast.

He has 15 programs on the war: the cavalry, the artillery, the soldiers' lives. On Saturday morning he was AWOL, but an able substitute, Bill Pulig, a podiatrist at the United States Army War College in nearby Carlisle, stood in for him.

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About 15 guests occupied plastic lawn chairs on a gravel patio outside the inn's dining room, sun breaking through, grass still dewy. Mr. Pulig, who is also a Civil War re-enactor, stood before us in a cavalry trooper's uniform, but with only the collar button buttoned. ''Regulations,'' he said. ''The uniforms were made of wool and it got pretty hot. Nevertheless the generals wanted the buttons buttoned.''

Apparently the Army has always been the Army. It insisted on uniformity at the collar but failed to mention the rest of the jacket, so most overheated soldiers left the other buttons undone.

Mr. Pulig had plenty of props, including a saddle and a trooper's belt with sword, holster and sidearm. The trooper also carried a carbine: basically a rifle with a short barrel that was effective only at close range but had the advantage, for the horse, of not being long enough to swat its ears.

Props need actors, and Mr. Pulig quickly pulled from his audience the most likely helper, Laura Dietrick, 11. She had come with her parents, Dave and Jeanne, and her sister, Amy, 6, from Nazareth, Pa., near Allentown, to see the sights. Suddenly she had become one.

By the time Mr. Pulig was through, Laura was swathed in a trooper's jacket, a hat, a greatcoat and much more. Mr. Pulig told her she would receive a daily ration of 13 hardtack crackers (basically kindergarten paste) and enough beans to make six pints of coffee.

So much for the romance of soldiering.

''Most of the stuff you see in the John Wayne movies is totally inaccurate,'' Mr. Pulig said, debunking the notion that a trooper could fire 8, 10 or 20 pistol rounds without reloading or stopping to fit caps to miniballs.

Among his more interesting anecdotes: the Union army trained tens of thousands of horses for its cavalry, but training meant simply that a horse could stand to have a saddle and a rider on its back. A federal trooper would still have to train the horse to be ridden in battle.

The Rebel cavalry, he said, was often better prepared because horse and rider knew each other well.

''In the Confederate Army, you showed up with your own horse,'' Mr. Pulig said. ''Otherwise you'd be in the infantry.''

Canon of Cannons

On our second morning at the inn, Charlie Tarbox appeared, with mutton-chop whiskers and garbed in a tattered Union uniform. He had a full house, almost 20 boarders. We sat with fresh coffee and orange juice. Mr. Tarbox explained artillery.

Cannons are everywhere on the battlefield. They all look the same: iron or bronze barrels resting on two large wooden wheels. Basically metal tubes to propel solid iron balls.

Not that simple, it turns out. Mr. Tarbox, who performs with the zeal of a patent-medicine pitchman, described in layman's terms how 12-pound cannonballs that once landed with a thud, possibly injuring just one infantry soldier, eventually became high-velocity rocks, skipping like stones, hitting one man, then another, then another.

The record for one cannonball, he said, was 32 soldiers at the Battle of Zorndorf in 1757, when Prussian and Russian troops clashed.

A typical Tarbox observation: the romance of war suddenly soured by reality.

This came through time and again on the tour. Once you see the wide-open pasture that Pickett's men had to cross, moving without cover toward the Union redoubts above them, romance seems an alien concept.

Maybe it's the contradictions of Gettysburg that continue to keep people in thrall. Pointless death, but death with honor. Evidence comes from the soldiers themselves, quoted in ''Guide to the Battle of Gettysburg,'' edited by Jay Luvaas and Harold W. Nelson. In his after-action report, Maj. Charles S. Peyton, Ninth Virginia Infantry, commanding Brig. Gen. Richard B. Garnett's brigade in Pickett's division, wrote:

''The brigade went into action with 1,287 men and about 140 officers . . . sustained a loss of . . . 941 killed, wounded, and missing. . . . Never had the brigade been better handled and never has it done better service in the field of battle. There was scarcely an officer or man in the command whose attention was not attracted by the cool and handsome bearing of General Garnett, who, totally devoid of excitement or rashness, rode immediately in rear of his advancing line, endeavoring by his personal efforts, and by the aid of his staff, to keep his line well closed and dressed. He was shot from his horse while near the center of the brigade, within about 25 paces of the stone wall.''

Reliving the Past

Gettysburg, Pa., is about 210 miles southwest of New York City. Here is a sampling of attractions in the area, along with travel in formation. All the locations are in Gettysburg, unless otherwise noted.

GETTYSBURG NATIONAL MILITARY PARK. Nearly 6,000 acres, more than 20 miles of roads and roughly 1,400 monuments. Most visitors drive, following a 14-point auto tour. This can be done by following the free map available at the visitor center, by buying more elaborate maps at the bookstore or by buying tape or CD audio tours. Licensed guides may be retained, and there are commercial tours via bus and horseback. Bikes are permitted. Many visitors start with a 30-minute viewing of the electric map, a giant relief map at the visitor center, 97 Taneytown Road, opposite the National Cemetery. Narration and blinking lights help orient visitors to the battlefield and the progression of the three-day fight. Admission: $3 for adults (17 and over); $2.50 for those over 62; $2 for ages 6 to 16; under 6, free. Hours: Park grounds and roads, daily, 6 a.m. to 10 p.m.; visitor center, daily, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.; in summers to 6 p.m. Admission is free. Information: (717) 334-1124, extension 431.

CYCLORAMA. A 360-degree depiction of Pickett's charge, painted in the 1880's by Paul Philippoteaux. A 20-minute program, next to the visitor center. Additional admission required: $3 for adults (17 and over); $2.50 for those over 62; $2 for ages 6 to 16; under 6, free. Information: (717) 334-1124, extension 431.

AUTO TOURS. Tape and CD tours cost $10 to $15, available at the bookstore.

GUIDED TOURS. By licensed battlefield guides. Fees range from $35 for a two-hour tour with up to 5 people, to $75 an hour for groups of 16 or more.

BUS TOURS. Gettysburg Tours, 778 Baltimore Street; (717) 334-6296.

EISENHOWER NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE. The farm where Dwight D. Eisenhower retired after his presidency. Open daily April through October, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.; closed Mondays and Tuesdays from November through March. Reached by shuttle bus from the battlefield visitor center, where tickets may be bought: $5.25, adults; $3.25, ages 13 to 16; $2.25, ages 6 to 12. Information: (717) 338-9114.

Where to Stay

BATTLEFIELD BED AND BREAKFAST INN. 2264 Emmitsburg Road, on the southern edge of the battlefield; (888) 766-3897 or www.gettysburgbattlefield.com. Daily rate, based on double occupancy, $135 to $205 ($20 a day for each additional person); all with private bath and including breakfast and an hourlong participatory historical lecture and demonstration each morning at 8 followed by a carriage ride around the farm. Families welcome.

GETTYSBURG HOTEL. This historic hotel on Lincoln Square in the center of the town is a descendant of the one on the site in 1797; (717) 337-2000. Through mid-September, daily room rates, based on double occupancy, $110 to $152 weekdays; $121 to $157 weekends; no additional charge for a child in the room.

NATIONAL MOTEL CHAINS. Days Inn, Econo Lodge, Holiday Inn and others are amply represented in the area.

Where to Eat

DOBBIN HOUSE TAVERN. 89 Steinwehr Avenue; (717) 334-2100. Gettysburg's oldest building (1776), the Dobbin house was the home of the Rev. Alexander Dobbin, his wife and 19 children. Seafood, steaks and chops and rich desserts. Full bar. Springhouse Tavern for casual dining. Full-course dinner for two, about $60.

CASHTOWN INN. A small hotel and bed-and-breakfast on Old Route 30, about eight miles west of Gettysburg. Information: (717) 334-9722, (800) 367-1797 or www.cashtowninnn.com. An 18th-century inn that served as headquarters for the Confederate Gen. A. P. Hill. Standard American fare. Dinner for two, about $55.

Getting There

BY CAR. Gettysburg is a four-and-a-half-hour drive from New York City along the New Jersey Turnpike, to Exit 6, and then the Pennsylvania Turnpike, to Exit 17. From there take Route 15 south for 28 miles to Gettysburg. There is no rail or bus service to Gettysburg.

Tourist Information

THE WEB: Two Web sites will get you started, one for Gettysburg the town and one for Gettysburg the battlefield. For information on lodging, food, attractions and special events: www.gettysburg.com; for information about the battlefield: www.nps.gov/gett//. The visitor center at the battlefield provides free maps and schedules of lectures by park rangers. The center's bookstore sells maps, tape and CD tours and nearly every book on the battle and the Civil War. In town the original railway station, built in 1858, has been turned into a visitors' bureau.

Recommended Reading

''GUIDE TO THE BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG.'' Edited by Jay Luvaas and Harold W. Nelson (University Press of Kansas, 1994; $12.95). A 240-page paperback with a step-by-step account of the battle, with maps and official reports by commanding officers.

''THIS HALLOWED GROUND: THE STORY OF THE UNION SIDE OF THE CIVIL WAR'' by Bruce Catton (Doubleday, 1956; Wordworth Military Library paperback, $12.99). The Pulitzer Prize-winning one-volume history of the war.

''THE KILLER ANGELS,'' by Michael Shaara (1974; Random House hardcover, $24; Ballantine paperback, $12), winner of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. An account of the battle through the eyes of some of its commanders. CHARLES STRUM